Colliding Galaxies Tearing at Each Other with Gravity and Radiation

Astronomers recently used a pair of powerful telescopes to zero in on a cosmic battle going on some 11 billion light-years away from us. The combatants are a pair of galaxies charging at each other over and over again, at velocities upwards of 500 kilometers per second. According to one of the scientists studying the scene, one galaxy is cutting into the heart of the other with a blast of radiation.

Jun 10, 2025 - 19:10
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Colliding Galaxies Tearing at Each Other with Gravity and Radiation

This image, taken with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), shows the molecular gas content of two galaxies involved in a cosmic collision. The one on the right hosts a quasar – a supermassive black hole that is accreting material from its surroundings and releasing intense radiation directly into the other galaxy. The X-shooter spectrograph in Chile studied the quasar's light as it passed through a gas halo around one of the galaxies. Credit: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO)/S. Balashev and P. Noterdaeme et al.

Astronomers recently used a pair of powerful telescopes to zero in on a cosmic battle going on some 11 billion light-years away from us. The combatants are a pair of galaxies charging at each other over and over again, at velocities upwards of 500 kilometers per second. According to one of the scientists studying the scene, one galaxy is cutting into the heart of the other with a blast of radiation.